29 Jul 2011

23 Jul 2011

The inaugural Letizia Bake Off was last year (named for the original buyer of the trophy) and it all started over a Lemon Drizzle cake. It quickly turned into an all out war between Jon and Meeta in a baking competition of three rounds: The Competition Cake (Lemon Drizzle), Chocolate and Freestyle. Meeta was the triumphant winner and hosted the 2011 Bake Off. I competed along with Tammie and Tim. We had three rounds too: The Competition Cake (Victoria Sponge), Citrus and Freestyle.

Poor Tammie had an oven crisis the morning of the competition and had to run to Jon's house to finish baking and I managed to travel an hour across town on several tubes and a bus with 3 cakes. There was a complicated score sheet and the final standings were:

19 Jul 2011

Ceviche of organic salmon, avocado, chilli, lime and coriander

When my parents were in town, they took me and two of my best friends out to lunch at Gordon Ramsay's York & Albany. C & J took me in for three months when I first moved to London and they really are like my brothers from another mother. Mum and Dad thought it was the least they could do to say thank you.

Jon was using his iPhone to give me a little more light for my photos, haha. I like having my own lighting team. He did it again when we went to Heston Blumenthal's new(ish) restaurant Dinner!

Roasted sea trout, braised fennel, olive

Roast beef

Rice pudding

Gosh I can hardly remember... I think it was a vanilla bean panacotta with pear and blue cheese ice cream (delicious!)

14 Jul 2011

I love HelloGiggles. The contributors post so often I just let the posts build up in my Google Reader and then pick the ones I want to read. This struck a chord with me today. Something us girls are always reminding ourselves and our girlfriends, but it never seems to stick. Repetition must help! (Obviously these are not my words at all. Click on Erin's name to read the rest of her Single Girls Guide on HelloGiggles.)

I feel like a lot of girls out there like to complain about all the losers they’ve dated in the past, and about what awful luck they’ve had in relationships. I’d like to address this issue directly to you ladies with the disclaimer that I used to be one myself.

The thing you seem to always overlook is that the common denominator in these guys is YOU, the girl who put up with them! You’re the theme that runs through them. You picked them. You begged them to pose for photo booth pictures with you, and to put hearts next to your name in their iPhone.

You saw the warning signs early on, but chose to ignore them. It’s because as women we think we have the ability to change someone. We think it’s our DUTY to change them. We make excuses for why they aren’t treating us the way we want to be treated, while simultaneously letting them know we’ll put up with anything. We don’t see these warnings for what they are, we see them as personal challenges. It’s why I’ve noticed a surge in guys playing “The No Game Game”.

If a guy comes to you and says he’s not really looking for a relationship, and he doesn’t want to hurt you and he thinks sleeping together might complicate things, you are in shock. The idea that he’s being honest and willing to lose possible nakedness as a result doesn’t fit into everything you’ve grown to understand about men. The awareness that he’s not trying to sleep with you, kinda just makes you want to sleep with him.

You feel compelled to prove that you can have fun and not fall in love. You also immediately assume that you can change his mind. Once he sees you in that one dress, and meets your friends, and eats your famous spaghetti bolognese, he’ll be hooked. He’ll obviously feel what you already feel. The sincerity of his intentions is almost offensive actually. You’re so accustomed to giving a guy a list of reasons why you shouldn’t sleep with him, and now he’s not even trying?

Your dad never warned you about this tactic. So you end up submerging yourself in a bubbly bath of denial and forging ahead with the plan that at some point you’ll come up with a plan. And then when he doesn’t want to be in a relationship with you, you’re pissed and you only have yourself to blame! The guy is stoked, he got laid and has nothing to feel guilty about because he did everything right. He didn’t play you, YOU played you! This is my point; stop blaming the dude for all your problems and take a look at how you got yourself here. While you’re whining about how terrible your ex boyfriend was, we’re wondering why you chose to stay with him for two years. We don’t believe it when a guy says something we don’t want to hear. We just turn it into what we assume he’s trying to say.

Someone once told me the simplest way to get into a good relationship is to believe what the person is saying to you. Ok fine, it was my therapist. But it’s true. He says he isn’t ready for a relationship? Believe him. He says he never wants kids? Believe him. We make things so much more complicated than they need to be. How many women do you know who have a big complaint in their relationship like that he doesn’t want to get married? And how many of those women admit that he told them he wouldn’t want to right from the beginning? Like, all of em! You don’t need to tap dance and rearrange your life to get someone to fit into it. Stick to your guns. Take responsibility for your choices. There are no victims, only volunteers. My friend Josh said that to me tonight and I thought, that’s the perfect ending to this post!

13 Jul 2011

HARRY POTTER MEMeIn honour of HP7P2 that I'm seeing on Friday! I'm so very excited and sad all at the same time. No doubt I will cry buckets. I was lucky enough to work at bookstore when the 7th book was released and we all dressed up (I was Cho Chang) and now I was lucky enough to live in London when the world premier of the final movie happened. This is meant to be done over 30 days, but I never remember to post daily, so here goes...

Day 1 : Your favorite book. The Prisoner of Azkaban.

Day 2 : Your favourite movie. The Prisoner of Azkaban.

Day 3 : Is there any of the films adaptations that have made you angry because they’ve ignored important parts of the book? Not that I can think of.

Day 4 : Least favourite female character and why. Delores Umbridge because she's pure evil and I hate that she loves cats too.Day 5 : Favourite male character and why. Snape because he's just so complex and has a heart of gold after all!Day 6 : What do you think would be your favourite lesson. Charms.Day 7 : Favourite female character and why. Hermione because she started out like I was in primary school. Just a little know-it-all and bossy, but grew up to be just fine. I feel like my answers are all going to be somewhat shallow because I feel like I'm just going to say "because they're/it's awesome!" after everything.Day 8 : Harry Potter or Twilight?Gosh, do you even need to ask?! HARRY POTTER.Day 9 : Least favourite male character. Lucius Malfoy. He's just so sniveling and a pathetic excuse for a man by the last book.Day 10 : Horcruxes or Hallows. Hallows.Day 11 : What character would you say you are most like. Hermione.Day 12 : Favourite ship. Ron/Hermione.Day 13 : Least favourite movie. Maybe Order of the Phoenix, but that was also my least favourite book. Or maybe Chamber of Secrets...Day 14 : Team Voldermort or Team Harry. Team Harry!Day 15 : Who would be your best friends at hogwarts. (Three only) Hermione, Lee Jordan and... er... Ron?Day 16 : Your favorite Golden Trio moment. Way too hard. I did love the chess scene in Philosopher's Stone. And anything to do with Hermione's amazing bottomless bag.Day 17 : Are you excited about The Deathly Hallows movie or scared it won’t do the book justice ? EXCITED.Day 18 : Least favourite book. Order of the Phoenix. So hard to get through. And cried when Sirius died.Day 19 : Do you prefer the books or films? Books definitely.Day 20 : If you had to meet one member of the cast, who would it be? D-RAD. I want him to be my BFF and invite him to all of my dinner parties.Day 21 : Out of all the characters that died, if you could bring one back, who would it be? Lupin. Wahhh! Still so upset he died.Day 22 : What house would you want to be in. Gryffindor or Ravenclaw.Day 23 : Any part of the books/movies that makes you cry. When Sirius died, when Hedwig died, when I realised Lupin and Tonks died, when I realised I'd never read a new Harry Potter book...Day 24 : Any particular scene you wished would have been put in the movie but it wasn’t. Hmm... not that I can remember.Day 25 : Nineteen years later. Are you happy how it turned out, or do you wish something was different? I felt it was a little unnecessary and a bit happy-happy-fan-fiction-end-y, but I understand why JK Rowling did it. No one can mess with her characters now, and it puts a lot of speculation to bed.Day 26 : If you could be able to work one spell without a wand what would it be? Erm... pass.Day 27 : Would you rather own The Invisibility Cloak, The Resurrection Stone or The Elder Wand? Definitely the Cloak.Day 28 : Do you listen to Wizard Wrock; what do you think about it? Ah, no. What's that?Day 29 : Did you enjoy A Very Potter Musical? I've only seen bits. Love Darren Criss though.Day 30 : What affect has Harry Potter made on your life and how much does it mean to you? Mum bought me the first one when I was 12 and I scoffed and said I was too old for witch and wizard books. Then I read the first chapter and I remember going over to Mum saying "It's so good! It's so good! Thank you for buying this for me!" It's had a big impact. Friends would call me the night of a book release asking if I'd finished it yet because they wanted to talk about it. I remember Amelia calling me almost in tears after OotP. Seeing some of the cast walking the red carpet reduced me to an excitable 12yo again. I'm going to miss it!